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The Fourth is back! Mayor McGinn, local businesses partner up to save fireworks

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People came to Gas Works Park as early as noon for the 10pm fireworks display. Every year tens of thousands come to Lake Union for Seattle's only fireworks show. July 4th 2012. (Joshua Lewis / KOMO News)

In a much-hyped press conference this morning, Mayor Mike McGinn unveiled a new plan to keep the fireworks over Lake Union, which relies heavily on Seafair, who stepped in at the eleventh hour to save summer forever -- or at least, for the foreseeable future.

Relying on multi-year corporate sponsorships, as well as agreements from vendors to drop prices, Seafair, the Chamber of Commerce, and the Mayor's office have secured a sustainable, long-term plan to finally end the will-they-or-won't-they dance of the last fiveish years.

Major sponsors include Starbucks, Amazon, DoubleDown Interactive, Wells Fargo, and yes, even the bearded beast himself, Tom Douglas. They're all in for a minimum of three years.

This partnership began a few weeks ago, when the Mayor announced that he was working with Seafair to try to rescue the show, after OneReel, the production company who had been charged with operating the show for the past several years, announced that they were unable to raise the funds.

Speaking about previous years, McGinn noted that "Seafair is the type of organization that, year after year...raises money." He called it "a good fit," and gave credit to OneReel, who had "done the best they could."

"We just got the team together, and then we stand back and let them work," McGinn stated.

McGinn also noted that the City of Seattle waived two fees -- the parks fee and the barricade fee -- to help cut overall the overall cost of the show. OneReel had quoted the show at costing about half a million dollars; McGinn stated that the new plan would cost much less than that, though he didn't offer a dollar amount.

The new plan also includes a new fireworks supplier. The show of "patriotic pyrotechnics" will last 20 minutes, but the events at Gasworks Park will go on all day.

McGinn admitted that the show might be a little different, joking that "you're going to have to show up to see it.